Whoosh. Rustle.
The wind in the deep valleys of the Alpine snow-capped mountains blew without pause. The wrecked train cars were like twisted whistles, and as the cold wind passed through them, the air pressure produced a strange, whistling sound.
Azazel panted heavily, his chest heaving as he exhaled great clouds of white breath. Steve watched the red-black shadows and dark smoke around Sebastian Shaw gradually dissipate, then raised his shield to protect Azazel, fixing his gaze on Shaw.
Shaw touched his face, neck, and body. His finely tailored black wool coat had been slashed to shreds. As the cold wind blew, ragged strips of fabric fluttered around him, completely ruining his gentlemanly appearance and exposing large areas of fairly sturdy-looking flesh.
"Your knife..."
Shaw narrowed his eyes, staring hard at the roughly fifty-centimeter-long, bright silver dagger with a faint blue-gray tint in Azazel's hand. He then glanced at the shield Steve held in front of himself, pondering something.
If not for his mutant ability to absorb energy having evolved once again after his secondary mutation, Shaw might have been injured by the countless slashes and stabs just now.
Those unusual daggers were extraordinarily sharp. Under fast enough slashes, his body absorbed kinetic energy more slowly; it wasn't as effective as absorbing the energy from blunt impacts.
Every one of Azazel's piercingly sharp stabs tore through Shaw's clothes. Only after reaching his skin could their force be neutralized. If Shaw's mutation, which let him absorb energy, hadn't reached the molecular level, he might already have been cut to ribbons.
"His reaction speed is limited. He can't keep up with me, but I feel like he's not simply tough-skinned."
Azazel quietly shared his observations with Steve. He'd attacked for about three seconds at his maximum teleporting speed, saving some of his